As Long As He Needs Me
by Scarlet Secret
Summary: A series of stories that depict the sacrifices of the women in the war.


As Long as He Needs Me

_As long as he needs me...  
Oh, yes, he does need me...  
In spite of what you see...  
...I'm sure that he needs me._

1.

It had been a long time since Bellatrix had truly believed in the ethics and motives of Lord Voldemort. But she knew she could never leave him; he needed her as much as she did him. And she was glad to die with that thought. He was the greatest Lord of the age, the most powerful wizard that had ever lived and he needed her by his side or else he would cease to be all that he was.

So many years in Azkaban and they were all for him. All for the love of her Lord, a man who never loved anything but accidentally let it show on more than one occasion that he needed her.

She remembers being a teenager, a beautiful, intelligent, talented one at that but she had never really had many friends and the boys seemed to be too intimidated to ask her to Hogsmeade. So she had been lonely and when her friends had hurt her without even realising it hurt her so much that the loneliness had seemed crippling and even in Azkaban she doesn't think she has ever been that miserable.

There at least she was alone by force. Nobody was allowed to see her or visit her and she didn't have to face the fact that her teenage self had been either crippling dull or just so thoroughly repulsive that people would lie to her about the time they were meeting. Or 'forget' to mention the party for that night. They claimed it hadn't mattered but she had never forgotten and they treated her as though she were obsessive. And then her opinions about the world had begun to change and she remembers being so very supportive of her friends and them ignoring her when she needed them most.

She remembers sobbing for sheer loneliness and feeling so pathetic that she shouldn't have been alive. And she remembers feeling the only person she could have confided in wasn't interested in her enough to care. But when she had gone to him he had cared, he had listened to her rage and her hatred and she felt him mould her. Years later she knows what she does is wrong, fifteen years sitting on her own had really put the Dark Lord in perspective, but he had come for her. She was his greatest, his most trusted servant and she was determined to be his most loyal. For the first time in her life she had been wanted and needed. 

She was his lieutenant. She was his greatest warrior and he called her his favourite. When they went to Hogwarts she was the first into the midst of the fight, battling valiantly for the Dark Lord, not caring about blood supremacy but so very determined that he HAD to win that her chest hurt with the need. When they had won she had walked next to her Lord into the Great Hall of Hogwarts School and when she had heard Minerva McGonagall, (the fair, just teacher who had shared small smiles of amusement with Alice in their Transfiguration lessons that had infuriated Bella so much) when she had heard McGonagall scream with sorrow she had laughed and every eye in the hall had been on her.

They had hated her, loathed her, wanted her dead, wished all manner of brutal, violent punishment on her – but they had been forced to look.

Harry Potter was dead. Had been dead. She had seen him fall; seen her Lord triumphant. And yet he was stood in front of them all; breathing, strong and healthy and still the fucking centre of attention! She wanted him dead so much it hurt. She was glad when he was dead because it meant he couldn't command everybody's fucking attention again! But he was here. He was still fighting and she had to admire that in a strange way, Snape had told her that the boy had grown up in more or less seclusion and she certainly felt sympathy for the loneliness of that.

The fight continued and somebody she knows is a Weasley pushes her way into Bella's path and she's suddenly aware of two things: that everybody is watching her and that she is going to die. The Weasley woman may not be much really, but Kingsley Shaklebolt is here somewhere and she's already fought McGonagall tonight and had to run away like a coward. She's outnumbered, even enough of the students could overpower her really, and she's determined to die spectacularly and wait for her Lord in the next life.

She knows that he doesn't need her here for his death.

_  
_"…Bitch!"

She laughs like Sirius. He got plenty of attention.


End file.
